Jul 16, 2016

PROFILE: STEVEN SPIELBERG

'When Steven Spielberg is enthused, which is often, his sentences pick up speed and momentum, the words
seemingly unable to leave his mouth fast enough, coming in a long unpunctuated
sentences that have you worried he’s going to forget to breath. We are
sitting in the conference room of his production offices at Amblin Partners, a
two-story baked adobe building that looks a little like a cross between Fred
Flintstones cave and a Mexican resort chalet, situated in a quiet corner of the
Universal lot surrounded by lawns, palm tress and slightly fake-looking
boulders. On one wall of the conference room sits three Norman Rockwell
originals and the famous Rosebud sled from Citizen Kane, mounted inside a
protective glass case. Downstairs are an editing suite, a screening room,
complete with candy and refreshments, a daycare centre, and a restaurant-sized
kitchen. Spielberg
arrives tailed by a small team of assistants and assorted PR personnel waiting
on his every word, like President Bartlett surrounded by his staffers in the
West Wing. He is dressed in a rather natty suede jacket, his grey hair combed
neatly, one of those men who never quite escaping the impression of having the
finishing touches to any outfit provided by his wife. He sits down opposite me
and clasps his hands together, a smile on his face, thumbs towards the ceiling
with an attitude that says: what’s next. You get the sense of a formidable,
fast-processing, if friendly, intelligence, courteously shutting down the 20
other things he has on the go in order to pivot his attention to you. “Because
I’m so compartmentalized in my thinking, I can think ahead a lot,” he
tells me. “I can think very deeply forward and that’s my problem. It’s a
blessing and it’s a curse.”When he was
a child, his mother would tell him that his grandparents were coming to visit
from Ohio, saying “its something to look forward to, they’re coming in two
weeks…” He would count down with her. “Its something to look forward to,
they’ll be here in a week.” Arguably, the countdown never stopped. Looking
forward turned into the Spielberg occupation par excellence; from it derives
his signature genre (sci-fi), his signature tone (optimistic), his signature
narrative mode (Hitchcockian suspense), even his signature shot (an expectant
face in close-up). While completing post-production on his Roald Dahl
adaptation The BFG, and getting ready to shoot the virtual reality sci-fi
thriller Ready Player One, while also in talks with Tony Kushner on another
script, screenwriter David Koepp recently exchanged emails with him about ideas
for a fifth Indiana Jones sequel. “I said I know you’re mixing and prepping and
doing big interviews,” recalls Koepp. “Do you have the head space for it? You
may be trying to do air traffic control in your head right now.’ He wrote back
and said, ‘Let me worry about the air traffic control, you circle and chatter.’
Okay, here you go. I dumped all my ideas on him. Yeah, there’s a remarkable
amount of head space.” It
goes beyond multi-tasking — it actually calms him down, keeps him from the
monomania of falling too in love with whatever it is he’s doing, or thinking it
the best he’s ever filmed. It can also trip him up — literally. On the
set of The BFG, a film about the friendship of a kindly giant and a little girl
that mixes live action and motion-capture animation and frequently requiring
directing on three different scales at once, the floor was festooned with
snaking camera cables. “He was always tripping,” says star Mark Rylance,
who plays the BFG, when I ask him which aspect of the director’s behavior he
would zero in on if he were ever asked to play him. “It’s a hazardous place
with the cables and stuff anyway but he has a tendency to trip. We would laugh
and him and he would laugh too.
His mind is so full of ideas, full of thoughts in his head. I asked him once
what your element — earth, water, air, or fire — would you believe he said
air? If you did the exercise where
you try and locate a person’s centre of gravity, it would not be down here,
it would be up in his heart and in his head, you know.” ' — from my Spielberg profile for The Guardian

"The book is a must for Woody Allen fans" - Joe Meyers, Connecticut Post

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R E V I E W S

"What makes the book worth taking home, however, is the excellent text... by Tom Shone, a film critic worth reading whatever aspect of the film industry he talks about. (His book Blockbuster is a must).... Most critics are at their best when speaking the language of derision but Shone has the precious gift of being carried away in a sensible manner, and of begin celebratory without setting your teeth on edge." — Clive James, Prospect "The real draw here is Shone’s text, which tells the stories behind the pictures with intelligence and grace. It’s that rarest of creatures: a coffee-table book that’s also a helluva good read." — Jason Bailey, Flavorwire

"There’s a danger of drifting into blandness with this picture packed, coffee-table format. Shone is too vigorous a critic not to put up a fight. He calls Gangs “heartbreaking in the way that only missed masterpieces can be: raging, wounded, incomplete, galvanised by sallies of wild invention”. There’s lots of jazzy, thumbnail writing of this kind... Shone on the “rich, strange and unfathomable” Taxi Driver (1976) cuts to the essence of what Scorsese is capable of." — Tim Robey, The Sunday Telegraph

"A beautiful book on the Taxi Driver director's career by former Sunday Times film critic Tom Shone who relishes Scorsese's "energetic winding riffs that mix cinema history and personal reminiscence".' — Kate Muir,The Times"No mere coffee table book. Shone expertly guides us through Scorsese’s long career.... Shone shows a fine appreciation of his subject, too. Describing Taxi Driver (1976) as having ‘the stillness of a cobra’ is both pithy and apposite.... Fascinating stuff." — Michael Doherty, RTE Guide"An admiring but clear-eyed view of the great American filmmaker’s career... Shone gives the book the heft of a smart critical biography... his arguments are always strong and his insights are fresh. The oversized book’s beauty is matched by its brains”— Connecticut Post

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“The film book of the year.... enthralling... groundbreaking.” — The Daily Telegraph

“Blockbuster is weirdly humane: it prizes entertainment over boredom, and audiences over critics, and yet it’s a work of great critical intelligence” – Nick Hornby, The Believer

“Beautifully written and very funny... I loved it and didn’t want it to end.” – Helen Fielding“[An] impressively learned narrative... approachable and enlightening... Shone evinces an intuitive knowledge of what makes audiences respond... One of those rare film books that walks the fine line between populist tub-thumping and sky-is-falling, Sontag-esque screed.” – Kirkus Reviews

“Exhilarating.... wit, style and a good deal of cheeky scorn for the opinions of bien-pensant liberal intellectuals.” – Phillip French, Times Literary Supplement

“Startlingly original... his ability to sum up an actor or director in one well-turned phrase is reminiscent of Pauline Kael’s... the first and last word on the subject. For anyone interested in film, this book is a must read.” – Toby Young, The Spectator

“A history of caring” – Louis Menand, The New Yorker“Smart, observant… nuanced and original, a conversation between the kid who saw Star Wars a couple dozen times and the adult who's starting to think that a handful might have sufficed.” – Chris Tamarri, The Village Voice

"A sweet and savvy page-turner of a valentine to New York, the strange world of fiction, the pleasures of a tall, full glass and just about everything else that matters" — Gary Shteyngart, author of Super Sad True Love Story and Absurdistan